


Closure

by Lorraineee



Category: Percy Jackson and the Olympians & Related Fandoms - All Media Types, Percy Jackson and the Olympians - Rick Riordan
Genre: M/M, One-Shot, Post-Series, i wanted valdangelo stuff, not even well-written, procrastination whooo, tons of angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-12-16
Updated: 2013-12-16
Packaged: 2018-01-04 19:13:21
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,585
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1084711
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Lorraineee/pseuds/Lorraineee
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Promises don't always come through. And Leo knows that. But Nico <i>promised.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	Closure

**Author's Note:**

> So this is just a little ficlet I wrote while I was supposed to be doing my homework and working on my other fic. It took like, three hours and was mostly written while babysitting some sleeping kids. Also, it was late.

Leo's heart had never pounded harder than it was now. Not when he’d faced an army of creepy-crawlies from Tartarus, not when his mother had died. Never. It was pumping so forcefully that it hurt. Leo's stomach ached, the tension nearly making him throw up. The cold night air whooshed past as he sped through the streets, 68 in a 20 zone. The window was rolled down to cool Leo's burning skin, and the biting air assaulted his nerve endings, lighting them up like live wires. 

 

And one name echoed in his ears. 

 

Nico. 

 

It rushed in with the pounding of blood through his veins. It rang incessantly with every breath he took, impossible to ignore. 

 

He replayed the conversation in his head. 

 

"Hello? This is Leo."

 

"Yes," the voice on the other end of the phone had answered. "This is Officer Bradley of the NYPD. I am at Mercy Hospital. We need you to come quick as you can. We have a man here. We don't know his name but this number is the top of the contact list on his phone. In fact, it's one of only five."

 

Leo didn't say much, because black spots of panic were dancing in front of his eyes. 

 

"What - happened?" Leo had whispered jerkily into the receiver.

 

"He appears to have fallen off of an apartment building nearby. He's currently alive, but in serious condition. We need you to identify him. Do you know his name?"

 

Leo had the phone tucked in between his ear and his shoulder, trying frantically to start his pickup and register his situation. 

 

"Nico. Di Angelo." Leo choked the name out, voice cracking. 

 

The officer had thanked him and hung up, and now Leo was here with nothing but a pounding heart and tears stinging his eyes.

 

Had Nico tried to kill himself? Leo had seen the scars from past attempts. Nico had opened up to him in the past, but never elaborated beyond the facts. He had tried slitting his wrists in Tartarus. He had taken a bottle of Aspirin a year after the final battle with Gaea. He had almost jumped in front of a bus but someone had pulled him back. 

 

But Nico had promised - _sworn_ \- that he was beyond that. The bus incident was over three years ago. Gaea was behind them. Their friends had their own lives in New Rome, and Piper and Jason had gone to Seattle. Leo had chosen New York. The city just... Called to him. 

 

And Nico had followed. Leo hadn't know until he ran into Nico in a grocery store, looking thinner than ever, more haunted. The final battle had been tough on him, and he had disappeared soon after. 

 

Months had passed. Leo got Nico to kiss him. Being in love with a dude was a new thing for Leo, but apparently not Nico. He had helped Leo become more comfortable with himself. 

 

And Nico had promised. 

 

Leo hit the steering wheel with his fist so hard he nearly swerved into the other lane. Not that there was much traffic. Tears poured freely down his face.

 

By the time he pulled up in front of Mercy, he was sobbing. He was so scared. He parked his truck carelessly and threw himself out of the cab, slamming the door and stumbling across the lot. 

 

The front doors of the emergency room slid open, illuminating a waiting room, too bright, containing a few sick or bloody people and a tired-looking receptionist. 

 

He ignored the stares. He dragged himself to the desk, supporting his body with his hands on the desk, shoulders slumped. “Nico di Angelo. Please. I need to see him.”

 

The receptionist stared too. “Hold on a second.” She tapped something out into the computer. 

 

“He’s in trauma right now, sir. You can’t see him. He hasn’t been released. I’m sorry.”

 

Leo slammed his hand on the counter, making a couple people jump. “Damn it! He could be dead! The police called me! They need me! Where the hell is he?!”

 

The receptionist chewed on her tongue. “Sir, I’m sorry but I’m not authorized --”

 

“Get me Officer Bradley! Get me someone! Now!” Leo was almost hysterical, half out of his mind with worry and fear.

 

The lady simply shook her head and apologized again. Leo felt his body slump. Adrenaline was coursing through his veins. He couldn’t breathe. “Just call for Officer Bradley. Please, he called me. Please.” He wasn’t shouting, but he wasn’t quiet either.

 

The receptionist – Monica, Leo read off her desk – did as he asked. “He’s coming, sir.”

 

Leo stood straight, feeling tears again. He limped over to a chair and leaned on the vinyl back, trying to catch his breath. 

 

“Leo Valdez?” Leo looked up to find a young police officer emerging from behind another sliding glass door across the room. “Follow me.”

 

Leo steeled his nerves and followed Bradley. “We need you to confirm the identity of one of the patients.” He spoke with a restrained tone, like he was afraid to say too much.

 

“How is he? What happened?” Leo’s voice shook and he didn’t try to control it.

 

“Again, he appears to have fallen --”

 

“He jumped, didn’t he?”

 

The officer didn’t acknowledge Leo’s question, simply continued. “Right now the doctors have him relatively stable but he’s not stable enough to be moved to the ICU. It’s a little touch and go right now, apparently. We just need you to identify him for us.”

 

They had arrived in the midst of a bustling room the size of two football fields, mostly taken up by curtained rooms. The officer pulled back one of these to expose Leo’s worst nightmare.

 

Only three doctors stood by the bed, but they were bloody, and their shoulders slumped, as if in defeat. One of them stepped to the side and Leo got a clearer view of the figure on the bed. 

 

Through a forest of tubes and wires, a thin, deathly pale face emerged. And it was Nico all right. The floor around him was bloodied, and various bandages, cloths, and contraptions lay discarded to the side. One of the doctors, a woman, held a stethoscope to Nico’s chest to hear his heart beat. Another one closely scrutinized one of many monitors a few feet to the right of the bed. The final was examining some papers, a crease between his eyebrows. If Leo could have seen his mouth behind the surgical mask, he would have seen a frown.

 

Leo registered all of this in just a few seconds. His knees gave out. Bradley caught him before he hit the floor, but just barely. Leo opened his mouth to apologize, but instead he let out a kind of anguished moan.

 

“Mr. Valdez? Sir?” Two of the doctors looked up. 

 

“Oh my gods. Nico,” Leo muttered, trying to think, but white bursts of light exploded in his field of vision and he couldn’t think, he couldn’t feel, because there was Nico and he was dying right before his eyes and it was Leo’s _fault_ \--

 

And before he knew it, Leo was yelling. His lungs hurt and his chest hurt and everything hurt but he didn’t care. “Nico! No! Goddammit! You promised me! You promised!” Leo wrenched his way out of Bradley’s grasp and launched himself toward Nico.

 

“Sir, please, we need you to --”

 

But Leo fought the doctors. He only had one goal: get to Nico. “Don’t you dare die, di Angelo, because I will fucking kill you!” Leo’s throat hurt and he was screaming. “Don’t die! Don’t, you – you – Nico! Don’t do this! You’re so _selfish_! You _promised me! You promised!_ ”

 

The cop was on top of him, and Leo collapsed under the weight. He didn’t try to get back up. “He promised,” Leo sobbed into the floor. 

 

He tried to take a breath in, but it wasn’t working, so he rolled over. He sucked in another breath, staring up at the lights. Bradley’s face swam above him. “Can you stand?” His voice sounded like it was coming from underwater. 

 

Leo nodded and allowed himself to be pulled upwards. Immediately he folded over, hands on his knees, trying to catch a breath. “I can’t breathe,” he muttered. “Gods, Nico. Why would he do this?” He asked no one in particular.

 

He heard a doctor talking, so he straightened out again. “…Major injuries. That isn’t to say he can’t survive them, but I’d say at this rate the chances aren’t good.” 

 

Leo shook his head. The doctor trailed off in the middle of saying something about internal trauma. “You don’t know him. He’s strong. He can’t… he won’t. You have to save him.” His voice sounded hollow, dead.

 

“Sir?”

 

“You have to save him.”

 

The doctor sighed. “Sir. We’ve done all we can. It’s up to him now.”

 

“No,” Leo protested. “You have to. You have to because that’s your job. He can’t just die. If he dies, I’ll be alone. He won’t die. He won’t because you’ll do whatever it takes to _make him fucking live_. Got it!? Make him live! He has to live!” He felt more desperate rage seize his heart. Rage at the world, at Nico, at these goddamn doctors who refused to do their damn jobs. At fate, so cruel to take everything he loved. He wanted to scream. He wanted to break something. He wanted to take the man he loved by the shoulders and shake him until he woke up. 

 

By four AM, Leo was on the floor of the triage center, guarding Nico because they still couldn’t risk moving him. 

 

By four-thirty, they declared that they could take him to the ICU.

 

By five-fifteen, Nico lay in another bed and Leo was allowed to sleep on a couch nearby. He didn’t even close his eyes.

 

At six-thirty-six precisely, alarm bells sounded. Leo was the first one to Nico’s side.

 

By six-forty-five, Leo had to be removed from the room because he had a doctor by the shoulders, shaking him and shrieking at him to save Nico.

 

By seven Nico was in emergency surgery. Leo waited in the waiting room, head between his knees with his feet on the chair, gripping his hair. 

 

At nine-twenty-nine, a doctor came out and told the only other lady in the room that her husband had lived. She screamed and collapsed on the ground. 

 

At nine-forty-two, another doctor came out, undaunted by the woman’s piercing shrieks. He approached Leo.

 

At nine-forty-two and thirty-seven seconds, the doctor opened his mouth.

 

Leo blinked. He hadn’t heard the words. “What?”

 

“Sir, I’m sorry. But Mr. di Angelo didn’t survive his surgery. He died on the operating table at nine-twenty-three this morning. We did everything we could to revive him, but his injuries were just too much. The brain damage and internal…” 

 

Leo wasn’t listening anymore. He was backing away from the man, so stiff and solemn before him, like an icicle. The lines on his face blurred with Leo’s tears. His glasses became blobs of gray. 

 

Leo didn’t remember sliding down the wall, but he remembered hitting the ground. The woman’s screams had faded. Everyone in that waiting room was watching him. Leo rested his elbows on his knees, pulling his hair back with his hands, and held his breath.

 

Maybe if he didn’t breathe he could suffocate himself.

 

“What am I supposed to do?” He asked the doctor, and the doctor replied.

 

“Mercy Hospital has many grief counselors available --”

 

“No,” Leo said, voice thin. “I don’t want a shrink. What am I supposed to _do?_

 

“He’s gone, he’s gone, he’s gone, he’s killed himself and he survived hell, literally hell, and he’s gone and offed himself, the bastard. What am I supposed to do?”

 

The doctor didn’t reply.

 

“Just go home? My apartment is empty. What do I do with his stuff? Throw it out? Leave it there? What do I eat? Do I just cook for myself? Do I try to call our friends? Tell them? Tell them what? That he killed himself – after everything we’ve been through – just like that?”

 

Someone spoke, but Leo ignored that.

 

“Or do I rent a motel, drink for a few weeks until my liver is shot and return home with the empty bottles and burn his shit? His clothes. Do I give them to the Goodwill? ‘Sorry, these belonged to my dead boyfriend but I’m sure some homeless dude will love them.’” Leo spoke in a voice that reminded him of blank paper, minus the possibilities plus twice the papercuts.

 

Nobody could answer him.

 

\---

 

Looking back, Leo wasn’t sure how he got through that night. He wasn’t sure how he got through that week. 

 

He met Annabeth and Percy at the airport the next day and they cried with him. His friends were too sad to be confused about Nico and Leo’s relationship. 

 

Frank, Hazel, Piper and Jason came a few days later, and they rented a hotel room and Percy and Annabeth stayed with Leo. 

 

But his friends could only stay a few days. They had jobs to return to, lives to live. Leo had nothing.

 

They left with empty promises to return in a few weeks and to call every day. They left a hole gaping in Leo’s chest so big he was surprised they couldn’t see it. 

 

Leo was alone.

 

But he was used to alone. He had always been alone, and he dealt. He broke things, including his hand. He didn’t decorate for Christmas that year.

 

But the next year the tree was up the day after Thanksgiving, decorated and beautiful. He had eaten his feast alone, but it was okay. He sent gifts to his friends, and they visited with presents of their own. Leo woke up to an empty apartment, but the lights on the tree shimmered and he had some great gifts.

 

The best of which came from Jason.

 

Leo unwrapped his last because it was the smallest, and he had always done it that way. Inside was a box. Leo smiled and lifted the lid, then gasped. 

 

It was pictures. Pictures that had been taken on those rare days, so many years ago, that they had gotten to take off at camp half-blood. Pictures of Leo and Annabeth and Percy. Pictures of the seven of them, bruises fading weeks after that final battle with Gaea. And one in particular that almost made Leo burst into tears.

 

A Polaroid. Leo stood proudly at the helm of the Argo II. He had been saying goodbye to his ship before leaving for New York.

 

And he had dragged an unwilling Nico, carrying a handful of towels or something from belowdecks for Piper, into the frame. Leo was grinning proudly, one hand on the wheel, the other gripping Nico’s sleeve. Nico’s shoulders were hunched, but he was smiling just a little, and he looked genuinely healthy. It was taken before he disappeared. Both of them looked so young, so happy, and Leo smiled down at the glossy surface of the photo. 

 

And it was then that Leo knew. He knew he’d be okay. Because the love of his life had killed himself, and he had done his mourning. Because one day he’d meet someone who made him happy. Because he would never forget Nico, and what Nico had done for him. Because life would move on and the memories would fade and no, Leo wouldn’t be alone. 

 

And for the first time in two years, Leo was truly happy.


End file.
